Favorite Production Design

[BladeRunner2007]

What films do you think have the absolute best/your favorite production design? It can be either build sets or real locations.

1. Blade Runner
2. Alien
3. Aliens
4. Mad Max: Fury Road
5. The Shining
6. Dawn of the Dead (1978)
7. Star Wars (all films, but especially the OT)
8. Event Horizon
9. Alien vs Predator
10. Murder by Death
11. Evil Dead II
12. Watchmen
13. Suspiria (1977)
14. The Texas Chain Saw Massacre
15. Das Cabinet des Dr. Caligari (1920)

[L.J.]

Good idea for a thread, some of mine are.
Ben Hur
The Haunting remake
The Changeling
The Passion of the Christ
Lord of the Rings films
Alien
A Hidden Life
The Thin Red Line
Mad Max Fury Road

[Al_The_Strange]

Lord of the Rings tops my list easily. Love the New Zealand landscapes. Love the designs for the weapons, armor, artifacts, costumes, creatures, cities, castles, dungeons, and everything. I'm enamored by the Norse influence put into the Rohan setting, although just about every setting looks phenomenal in their own ways. It all made Middle Earth feel real.

[slumcat]

1. Metropolis
2. The Leopard
3. 2001: A Space Odyssey
4. Citizen Kane
5. Playtime
6. Ben-Hur
7. The Ten Commandments
8. Cleopatra
9. The Fall of the Roman Empire
10. The Children of Paradise
HM: Hugo

[L.J.]

Forgot to mention Stalker.

[anomaly7]

In no particular order:

Batman & Batman Returns
Lord of the Rings
Mad Max: Fury Road
Pan's Labyrinth
Titanic
Hook
Grand Budapest Hotel
Tron: Legacy

[dancerslegs]

20th century only:

Intolerance (1916)
Dante's Inferno (1924)
Die Nibelungen (1924)
Metropolis (1927)
Docks of New York (1928)
The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928)
The Wind (1928)
The Blue Angel (1930)
À nous la liberté (1931)
Frankenstein (1931)
Vampyr (1932)
Mystery of the Wax Museum (1933)
Zoo in Budapest (1933)
Dames (1934)
The Scarlet Empress (1934)
Bride of Frankenstein (1935)
Gold Diggers of 1935 (1935)
A Midsummer Night's Dream (1935)
Things to Come (1936)
Lost Horizon (1937)
The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938)
Port of Shadows (1938)
Gone With the Wind (1939)
The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1939)
The Wizard of Oz (1939)
Foreign Correspondent (1940)
The Letter (1940)
Rebecca (1940)
The Thief of Baghdad (1940)
Citizen Kane (1941)
The Devil & Daniel Webster (1941)
How Green Was My Valley (1941)
The Sea Wolf (1941)
Casablanca (1942)
The Magnificent Ambersons (1942)
Jane Eyre (1943)
Gaslight (1944)
Henry V (1944)
Ivan the Terrible (1944-58)
Children of Paradise (1945)
Mildred Pierce (1945)
The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945)
The Spiral Staircase (1945)
A Matter of Life and Death (1946)
Beauty and the Beast (1946)
Duel in the Sun (1946)
Great Expectations (1946)
Odd Man Out (1946)
Black Narcissus (1947)
The Lady from Shanghai (1947)
Hamlet (1948)
Macbeth (1948)
Oliver Twist (1948)
Portrait of Jennie (1948)
The Red Shoes (1948)
The Black Book (1949)
Orpheus (1949)
The Third Man (1949)
Sunset Boulevard (1950)
An American in Paris (1951)
La Ronde (1951)
Othello (1951)
A Streetcar Named Desire (1951)
The Tales of Hoffmann (1951)
Moulin Rouge (1952)
Singin' in the Rain (1952)
The Five Thousand Fingers of Dr. T (1953)
Gate of Hell (1953)
Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome (1954)
Rear Window (1954)
A Star is Born (1954)
All That Heaven Allows (1955)
Richard III (1955)
The Night of the Hunter (1955)
Gervaise (1956)
Paths of Glory (1957)
The Seventh Seal (1957)
Sweet Smell of Success (1957)
Throne of Blood (1957)
Invention for Destruction (1958)
Touch of Evil (1958)
Vertigo (1958)
Journey to the Center of the Earth (1959)
A Midsummer Night's Dream (1959)
North by Northwest (1959)
Rocco and His Brothers (1960)
The Innocents (1961)
Last Year at Marienbad (1961)
The Fabulous Baron Munchausen (1962)
Harakiri (1962)
The Manchurian Candidate (1962)
The Trial (1962)
8 1⁄2 (1963)
The Haunting (1963)
Ikarie XB-1 (1963)
The Leopard (1963)
Scorpio Rising (1963)
Dr. Strangelove (1964)
Goldfinger (1964)
Kwaidan (1964)
Red Desert (1964)
Woman in the Dunes (1964)
The Ashes (1965)
The Fifth Horseman is Fear (1965)
Help! (1965)
Repulsion (1965)
Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors (1965)
Ten Thousand Suns (1965)
Andrei Rublev (1966)
Chimes at Midnight (1966)
Seconds (1966)
War and Peace (1966-67)
La Chinoise (1967)
Marketa Lazarová (1967)
The Fall of the Roman Empire (1967)
Hour of the Wolf (1968)
Once Upon a Time in the West (1968)
2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
The Conformist (1970)
Lucifer Rising (1970)
Valerie and Her Week of Wonders (1970)
Uncle Vanya (1970)
The Devils (1971)
Klute (1971)
Playtime (1971)
A Touch of Zen (1971)
Cries and Whispers (1972)
Solaris (1972)
Don't Look Now (1973)
The Hourglass Sanatorium (1973)
The Holy Mountain (1973)
Chinatown (1974)
The Godfather, Part II (1974)
The Parallax View (1974)
Barry Lyndon (1975)
1900 (1976)
All the President's Men (1976)
Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)
Eraserhead (1977)
Alien (1979)
All That Jazz (1979)
Apocalypse Now (1979)
Legend of the Mountain (1979)
Stalker (1979)
Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979)
The Elephant Man (1980)
The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
Flash Gordon (1980)
Kagemusha (1980)
The Shining (1980)
Diva (1981)
Heaven's Gate (1981)
Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
Reds (1981)
Blade Runner (1982)
Fanny and Alexander (1982)
Querelle (1982)
The Right Stuff (1983)
Once Upon a Time in American (1984)
Brazil (1985)
Ran (1985)
Taipei Story (1985)
Horse Thief (1986)
Street of Crocodiles (1986)
The Terrorizers (1986)
Wings of Desire (1987)
Damnation (1988)
The Legend of the Holy Drinker (1988)
My Twentieth Century (1988)
Batman (1989)
The Cook, the Thief, His Wife, and Her Lover (1989)
Dick Tracy (1990)
Ju Dou (1990)
Twilight (1990)
Barton Fink (1991)
Delicatessen (1991)
Prospero's Books (1991)
Raise the Red Lantern (1991)
Toys (1992)
The Baby of Macôn (1993)
Farewell My Concubine (1993)
Kalifornia (1993)
Schindler's List (1993)
True Romance (1993)
The Hudsucker Proxy (1994)
Institute Benjamenta (1994)
Sátántangó (1994)
Woyzeck (1994)
The City of Lost Children (1995)
Dead Man (1995)
Nixon (1995)
Hamlet (1996)
Lost Highway (1997)
Titanic (1997)

Sure I'm forgetting a bunch

[Jay H.]

Dark City (1998)

[steev210]

One of my favorite production designs is from The Poseidon Adventure (1972) by William Creber. The tagline for the film was "Hell, Upside Down!" Indeed it was and Mr. Creber's ingenious work is one of the reasons why the film was so successful and is considered to be a disaster classic.

Each of these inverted sets is a marvel...painstakingly built and beautifully lit that brilliantly transports the viewer inside the imploding, topsy turvy S.S. Poseidon with the flooded ballroom and fiery engine room being two of the highlights.

[Lee A Stewart]

[ArtVanderlay]

Recently watched The Hunger. That one's got beautiful lighting and blowing curtains.

[merlinjones]

Gone With the Wind
The Wizard of Oz
Black Narcissus
Sleeping Beauty
West Side Story
A Star is Born (54)
Meet Me in St. Louis
Flash Gordon
Blade Runner
Beauty and the Beast (46)
North by Northwest
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
Pinocchio
Bambi
How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying
The Three Caballeros
Babes in Toyland
My Fair Lady
Fantasia
Yellow Submarine
The Pirate
Frankenstein
The Bride of Frankenstein
Rear Window
Vertigo
The Birds
Forbidden Planet
Ben Hur
Notorious
Song of the South
Alice in Wonderland
Peter Pan
The Thief of Bagdad
Aladdin
Singin' in the Rain
A Matter of Life and Death
Pandora and the Flying Dutchman
The Red Shoes
Lady and the Tramp
One Hundred and One Dalmatians
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea
Young Frankenstein
The Rocky Horror Picture Show
Goldfinger
Citizen Kane
It's a Wonderful Life
Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer
The Sound of Music
The Ten Commandments
Cleopatra
The Graduate
Cinderella
Sweet Charity
Mary Poppins
Lost Horizon
The Big Country
Oklahoma (Todd AO)
TRON
The Incredibles
The Nightmare Before Christmas
How the Grinch Stole Christmas (66)
Alien
Metropolis
Oliver!
Twin Peaks (pilot)
Casablanca
Cabaret
Brazil
The Hunchback of Notre Dame (39)
Star Wars (77)
Superman the Movie
The Adventures of Robin Hood
The Night of the Hunter
Psycho
Chitty Chitty Bang Bang
The Lord of the Rings
Lawrence of Arabia
Excalibur
Batman (66)
Pufnstuf
Xanadu

[principehomura]

The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp
Black Narcissus
The Red Shoes
Barry Lyndon
Heaven's Gate
Kagemusha
Conan the Barbarian
Blade Runner
Ran
Brazil
The Adventures of Baron Munchausen
The Age of Innocence
Sweet and Lowdown
Gangs of New York
The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus
Jupiter Ascending

[UltraMario9]

Toys (1992)

[DR Herbert West]

1. Blade Runner
2. Alien
3. Blue Velvet
4. Hardware
5. Batman Returns

[trevanian]

Just skimmed the list, but has nobody mentioned STRANGELOVE yet? Adam's War Room alone is maybe among the most iconic designs in film history.

[Beckford]

Another long list, I'm afraid. But so much great work to be acknowledged:

Intolerance(1916)
Robin Hood(1922)
Noah's Ark(1928)
Spione/Spies(1928)
The Scarlet Empress(1934)
Bride of Frankenstein(1935)
Gold Diggers of 1935(1935)
A Midsummer Night's Dream(1935)
The Invisible Ray(1936)
Alexander Nevsky(1938)
The Hunchback of Notre Dame(1939)
The Mikado(1939)
Das Herz der Konigin/Heart of a Queen(1940)
The Sea Hawk(1940)
Stranger on the Third Floor(1940)
Citizen Kane(1941)
The Magnificent Ambersons(1942)
Saboteur(1942)
This Gun for Hire(1942)
The Song of Bernadette(1943)
Ivan the Terrible(1944)
La Belle et la Bete/Beauty and the Beast(1946)
Duel in the Sun(1946)
The Razor's Edge(1946)
Suspense(1946)
Ziegfeld Follies(1946)
Black Narcissus(1947)
Captain from Castile(1947)
The Exile(1947)
The Ghost and Mrs. Muir(1947)
The Lady from Shanghai(1948)
The Pirate(1948)
The Red Shoes(1948)
Criss Cross(1949)
The Third Man(1949)
Gun Crazy(1950)
Il Ladro di Venezia/The Thief of Venice(1950)
Rocketship X-M(1950)
Flame of Araby(1951)
Othello(1952)
The Story of Robin Hood(1952)
The Egyptian(1954)
The Night of the Hunter(1955)
Touch of Evil(1958)
Les Parapluies de Cherbourg/The Umbrellas of Cherbourg(1964)
The Masque of the Red Death(1964)
Yoyo(1965)
The Taming of the Shrew(1967)
2001: A Space Odyssey(1968)
Andrei Rublev(1969)
Hello Dolly!(1969)
Ryan's Daughter(1970)
The Boy Friend(1971)
Dr. Phibes Rises Again(1972)
The Hindenburg(1975)
Suspiria(1977)
Days of Heaven(1978)
Apocalypse Now(1979)
Blade Runner(1982)
Rumble Fish(1983)
Killer Klowns from Outer Space(1988)
Archangel(1991)
Europa(1991)
Stargate(1994)
Batman Forever(1995)
The Mummy(1999)
The Cell(2000)
Far From Heaven(2002)
Alexander(2004)
Troy(2004)
Kingdom of Heaven(2005)
War of the Worlds(2005)
Curse of the Golden Flower(2006)
The Fall(2008)
The Wolfman(2010)
Rise of the Planet of the Apes(2011)
The Tree of Life(2011)
Hawaizaada(2015)
Jupiter Ascending(2015)
Mad Max: Fury Road(2015)
The Revenant(2015)
Gods of Egypt(2016)
The Great Wall(2017)
King Arthur: Legend of the Sword(2017)
Kong: Skull Island(2017)
Aquaman(2018)
Mandy(2018)
Paddington 2(2018)
Stan & Ollie(2018)
Kalank(2019)

[levcore]

Looks like you already started this thread lol

[Cremildo]

Alien, absolutely. The interiors of the Nostromo and especially of the downed Juggernaut are peerless.

[GoneJoel]

Crimson Peak